


■wpr 



mmmmmmm 



;':-, jlpr ) ,, ::[,. 



to i: 



"J -V' -->-'-/ <y 




National Sodetf .©f.Cotoaial Dames, 

OM AjTlCMiC"! 

Resident in the State of Nebraska ' , 




r. * - ' 



Class / "&&/ 
Book - / Ofr ? 
Copyright N° 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




;^raoog^£f?"i^yQgaEa! 



Map of the Territory of Nebraska, "Mother of State: 



.fi % 



?>• 



(§ntt Ppott a %\mt $ 
m Jfciiragkt 



^ 



COMPILED FOR 



THE COLONIAL DAMES 



Mrs. Alexander C. Troup 

Descendant of Captain John Everett 
Massachusetts 



Illustrations Contributed by 
THOMAS R. KIMBALL, F. A. I. A. 



second edition 
Omaha: March, 1916 



Qe&icateb to 

THOSE NOBLE WOMEN WHO ARE 
STRUGGLING IN THE FLOOD OF 
NEW CONDITIONS AND FOREIGN 
INFLUENCES WHICH ARE POURING 
INTO OUR LAND, TO PRESERVE 
ANCIENT LANDMARKS, PERPETU- 
ATE THE HISTORY OF OUR STATE 
AND COUNTRY, EDUCATE THE 
YOUNG TO BECOME USEFUL AMERI- 
CAN CITIZENS AND HONOR THE 
MEMORY OF THOSE NOBLE MEN 
AND WOMEN CALLED PIONEERS. 



APR 15 1916 

Copyrighted March, 1916 



toA428853 



FOREWORD. 

Nebraska, while yet young, has reached that 
age and state of development when we can look 
back upon its remarkable growth with wonder 
that in so short a time so much has been accom- 
plished. It is the object of this book to bring 
before the people of this commonwealth a concise 
and complete history of its growth. It is the aim 
of the Colonial Dames to present this history in 
an attractive form and by thus reviewing the 
work of the builders of this great state inspire in 
the hearts of those now entering upon active life 
a desire to continue that work already begun. 

This historical work has been a labor of love 
to the author who has lived in Nebraska since its 
early beginning and who has seen it grow from a 
barren wind-swept prairie country, over which 
the blizzards raged in winter and the prairie 
fires swept in autumn, through grasshopper 
raids, scorching winds, tornadoes, floods and 
drouths until the efforts of its noble men and 
women have placed it in the first rank among the 
wealthy, beautiful and prosperous common- 
wealths of the Union. 

It is her earnest wish that the coming genera- 
tions may fully appreciate and emulate the work 
of those who toiled that others might reap so 
rich an harvest. 

Elsie DeCou Troup, 

Historian. 



THE NATIONAL SOCIETY 

of the 

COLONIAL DAMES OF AMERICA. 



"SALUTE TO THE FLAG." 

"To the Glory of God; 

And in grateful remembrance of those, our 
ancestors, who through evil report and loss of 
fortune, through suffering and death, main- 
tained stout hearts and laid the foundations of 
our country, we, the National Society of the 
Colonial Dames of America, pledge our loyal and 
affectionate allegiance to these our flags." 



PREAMBLE. 

"Whereas, History shows that the remem- 
brance of a nation's glory in the past stimulates 
to national greatness in the future, and that suc- 
cessive generations are awakened to truer patriot- 
ism and aroused to noble endeavor by the 
contemplation of the heroic deeds of their fore- 
fathers; therefore, the Society of Colonial Dames 
of America has been formed, that the descend- 
ants of those men who in the Colonial period by 
their rectitude, courage, and self-denial prepared 
the way for success in that struggle which gained 
for the country its liberty and constitution, may 
associate themselves together to do honor to the 
virtues of their forefathers, and to encourage 
in all who come under their influence, true patriot- 
ism, built on a knowledge of the self-sacrifice 
and heroism of those men of the colonies who 
laid the foundation of this great nation." 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

PAGE 

1-How Once Upon A Time Coronado Came To 
Quivira 15 

2-How Once Upon A Time Father Marquette 
Heard of Nebraska 23 

3-How Once Upon A Time The United States 
Bought Louisiana 29 

4-How Once Upon A Time the Fur Traders Came . 37 

5-How Once Upon A Time the Indians Roamed 
the Prairies 43 

6-How Once Upon A Time The Indian Trails Be- 
came Roadways 53 

7-How Once Upon A Time Humble Homes Were 
Built ...61 

8-How Once Upon A Time Transportation Was 
Limited 71 

9-Hoav Once Upon A Time Arbor Day Was 
Established 79 

10-Nebraska Triumphant 85 



How Once Upon a Time 

Coronado Came 

to Quivira 



"Ye who love the haunts of Nature, 
Love the sunshine of the meadows, 
Love the shadow of the forest, 
Love the wind among the branches, 
And the rain-shower and the snow-storm, 
And the rushing of great rivers 
Through their palisades of pine trees, 
And the thunder in the mountains, 
Whose innumerable echoes 
Flap like eagles in their eyries, 
Listen to these wild traditions." 



IV\£ ft^iSYXV^ fcfcvfAUJ 




gNCE upon a time this vast country which 
we call the United States was a great 
wilderness, inhabited only by tribes of In- 
dians. Whence they came no one knows. It is a 
subject upon which many historians have written 
and disagreed, and until the buried truths of the 
past are discovered the origin of the Indian must 
remain unexplained, — however much the mystery 
may lure to speculation, and however much the 



16 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

myths, legends and traditions may seem to afford 
ground for conjecture. All we know for a cer- 
tainty is that the redmen were here when the 
early explorers and the Pilgrims came, and that 
there are evidences in some parts of the conti- 
nent of a very ancient civilization to which long 
deserted ruins and tenantless temples testify. 

The love of adventure has ever tempted men 
to hazard their lives in the perils of the wilder- 
ness, and the history of the fifteenth and six- 
teenth centuries is filled with the accounts of 
their failures and achievements; — yet, whether 
failures or achievements they nevertheless, alike 
contributed to that Divine law which is Progress. 

The discovery of the Nebraska country, ac- 
cording to reliable historians, occurred "eighty 
years before the eastern shore was visited by the 
Pilgrims, sixty-six years before John Smith came 
to Virginia, and when Queen Elizabeth was a 
little girl." 

Modern research among old Spanish letters, 
journals and reports preserved in Spain opens 
to our vision a wonderful and astonishing chap- 
ter in Spanish exploration, which reads like 
romance, but is based on authentic records and 
the accounts of the brilliant Corona do and his 
march from the city of Mexico to the land of 
Quivira, and is a thrilling tale of adventure. 

Long years ago, in the early part of the 
sixteenth century, came an explorer, De Nar- 
vaez, and his followers, to the coast of Florida 
to perish miserably at the hands of hostile 



CORONADO CAME TO QUIVIRA 17 

Indians and from sickness caused by hardships, 
until only four men survived, who for six years 
remained with the tribes of Florida ; then, led by 
one named De Vaca, they decided to brave the 
perils of an unknown land and for two years 
wandered among savage tribes, being the first 
white men to cross the North American continent 
from Florida to Mexico. 

The story of their wanderings seems a fairy 
tale, yet, probably, they led to the discovery of 
the Nebraska country by white people. 

Roaming about on the trackless prairies, they 
met a company of Spanish slave-hunters and 
in this strange group of men, ragged and with 
long tangled hair, these Spaniards were astonished 
to find natives of their own country. De Vaca, 
overcome with joy at meeting friends after his 
long wanderings, related his experiences. 

Among other interesting events, he said he 
had been told by Indians that to the north lay 
rich and populous cities where gold and silver 
were plentiful. 

An Indian slave said that he knew of those 
cities to the north, and a Franciscan monk, Friar 
Marcos, sent out by Mendoza, viceroy of Mexico, 
reported that he had visited Cibola, the seven 
cities of the Zuni Indians. 

The Mexican government, influenced by these 
tales, sent out a gallant young cavalier named 
Coronado, with a following of three hundred 
Spaniards and eight hundred Indians to explore 
this land and capture the rich and populous 



18 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

cities, the viceroy having been instructed by 
Charles V. of Spain to outfit the expedition. 

This army of Spaniards and Indians, when re- 
viewed by those in command of the expedition, 
presented a wonderful and gorgeous appearance. 

"On February 23, 1540, the expedition started 
from Compostela, the capital of New Galicia (a 
western border province of Mexico of which 
Coronado was governor, now within the territory 
of Tepic, Mexico), situated about 375 miles 
northwest of the city of Mexico. Culiacan, the 
next place of importance it came to, was also 
in New Galicia (near the center of the present 
state of Sinaola). From Culiacan it went on 
northwesterly, crossing many rivers and follow- 
ing some along a part of their course, until it 
came to the Sonora river (now in the state of 
Sonora) which was followed, nearly to its source, 
to a pass in the mountains, not far beyond which 
it arrived at the headwaters of the river now 
called San Pedro (in the extreme north part of 
Sonora) which was followed some distance into 
the country now called Arizona; then, continuing 
northeasterly, the expedition passed near the 
place where Fort Apache, Arizona, was after- 
ward built; thence, continuing in the same di- 
rection, it reached the Zuni village called Hawi- 
kuh, the ruins of which are fifteen miles south- 
west of the present town of Zuni, in McKinley 
county, New Mexico. Hawikuh was one of the 
so-called seven cities of Cibola." 

Instead of rich and populous cities, of which 



CORONADO CAME TO QUIVIRA 19 

they had been told, they found Indian villages 
composed of huts made of stone and mud, and 
the Spaniards, seeking plunder, attacked these vil- 
lages; the Indians soon fled at the sight of the 
strange rushing figures on horseback, and as 
their only weapons were arrows and stones, they 
soon surrendered. Coronado was twice wounded 
during the fight. There was no gold or silver 
of much value, but considerable food supplies 
were obtained. 

After some time spent in New Mexico, Cono- 
rado, not wishing to return to Mexico empty 
handed, decided to lead his army north to a land 
called Quivira, where he was told there were 
rich cities, and where gold and silver were plenti- 
ful. An Indian named, ''The Turk," told Cono- 
rado that he knew of this land and offered to 
guide the expedition. The credulous Spaniards 
travelled northeasterly, but very indirectly, about 
1,200 miles to Quivira. But as many of his men 
wandered off and were lost on the prairies, 
when he had gone more than half the way, he be- 
gan to fear he could not obtain food for so large a 
company, notwithstanding many buffaloes were 
killed, so he sent the army back to New Mexico 
pushing on with thirty chosen men. Distrusting 
the Turk, who was put in chains, an Indian, named 
Ysopete, was chosen guide. 

When Quivira was reached, and found to be 
only an Indian country, without rich cities, the 
Spaniards put the Turk to death, who confessed 
that he had decieved them, hoping to lead them 
out of the right road through the wilderness to 



20 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

prevent them from destroying his own people 
who lived in the direction they were going, and 
thus proved himself a brave and patriotic man. 
After spending some time in Quivira, ruled over 
by an Indian chief, Coronado returned to New 
Mexico, October 20, 1541, arriving at Tiguex, 
whence he started for Quivira, April 23, and 
where his army was encamped. Tiguex was an 
important Indian village or pueblo, situated on 
the Rio Grande river, at a point not far south- 
west of Santa Fe and now in Sandoval county, 
New Mexico. 

The following spring Coronado started with 
the army to the city of Mexico, where he made 
his report to Mendoza, the viceroy, who was 
greatly disappointed at the failure and Coronado 
retired from active life, spending his last years 
in obscurity. 

It is impossible to find out to a certainty or 
definitely the situation of Quivira; but according 
to the most reliable students of the question it 
was nearly circular in shape; about one hundred 
miles in diameter, and was bounded on the north- 
west by the Republican river; its eastern bound- 
ary extended nearly to a point where this river 
enters the Kansas, and its southwest boundary 
nearly to the Arkansas at the great bend. The 
best authority upon this question, probably, says 
that: "there is no reason to suppose Coronado 's 
party went beyond the limits of the present state 
of Kansas," which, however, lies in what is 
known as the Nebraska country consisting of the 



CORONADO CAME TO QUIVIRA 21 

land drained by the Platte river and tributaries 
until the waters began to flow into the Arkansas 
river. 



How Once Upon a Time 

Father Marquette 

Heard of 

Nebraska 



"Came the Black Eobe-Chief, the Prophet, 
He the Priest of Prayer, the Pale face, 
With his guides and his companions, 
And the noble Hiawatha, 
With his hands aloft extended, 
Held aloft in sign of welcome, 
Waited, full of exultation, 
Till the birch canoe with paddles 
Grated on the shining pebbles, 
Stranded on the sandy margin, 
Till the Black Eobe of the Pale Face, 
With the cross upon his bosom, 
Landed on the sandy margin.' 



m, 



KjjlC I^Bffccforobe chief =fc]sr©]s| 




THE next record we have of Nebraska came 
from the frozen north. Far across the 
water, in sunny France, a boy of seven- 
teen, named Marquette, resolved to become 
a priest, and hearing tales of the savage Indians 
in the new land of Canada, who knew nothing of 
the Christian religion, decided his life should be 
devoted to them. 

The Jesuit order, to which he belonged, did 
not deem him ready for this great work until he 
was twenty-nine. Soon after this Marquette 
reached Canada and made his plans to carry the 
gospel to the western Indians. In company 
with Louis Joliet, he started from Mackinac 



26 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Island, May 17, 1673, with two bark canoes and 
five oarsmen. They passed along the south shore 
of the north peninsula of Michigan, ascended 
Green Bay and Fox Eiver, passed over the short 
portage to the Wisconsin and down that river 
to the Mississippi. 

Floating far down the stream, they suddenly 
were drawn into whirls of yellow water filled with 
floating trees which threatened to wreck their 
frail barks. These were the waters of the Mis- 
souri emptying into the Mississippi. Marquette 
learned from the Indians that by traveling up 
the stream he would come to a fertile country 
where lay the Platte River, and that in the moun- 
tains there was another river, the Colorado, flow- 
ing west. So he concluded there was one long 
river flowing to the Pacific and his map of the 
Nebraska country, giving the names of the 
Pawnee, Oto and Omaha Indians, bears a close 
resemblance to more modern and scientific maps. 
They descended as far as the mouth of the 
Arkansas, about 700 miles above the mouth of 
the Mississippi. They reached this point on the 
June 17, when, inferring that the great river 
fell into the Gulf of Mexico and not into the 
Pacific Ocean, they decided to return, starting 
July 17. They followed the Illinois River, and 
probably Chicago River to Lake Michigan, arriv- 
ing at St. Xaiver's Mission at the end of Septem- 
ber, 1673. Marquette started again for the Illi- 
nois country on October 25, 1674, arriving 
in the spring of 1675. Attempting to return 
to St. Ignace, he died on the shore of Lake 



FATHER MARQUETTE HEARD OF NEBRASKA 27 

Michigan, at a point now occupied by the city of 
Ludington, on the 18th day of May of that year. 
He lived in this country eight years and eight 
months and was deeply mourned by the Indians, 
who loved him for his gentle christian character. 



How Once Upon a Time 

the United States 

Bought Louisiana 



Iagoo, in Hiawatha, thus describes the com- 
ing of the white men to the Indian territory: 

"O'er it, said he, o'er this water 
Came a great canoe with pinions, 
A canoe with wings came flying, 
Bigger than a grove of pine-trees, 
Taller than the tallest tree-tops! 
In it, said he, came a people, 
In the great canoe with pinions 
Came, he said, a hundred warriors; 
Painted white were all their faces, 
And with hair their chins were covered ! 
And the warriors and the women 
Laughed and shouted in derision, 
Only Hiawatha laughed not, 
But he gravely spake and answered 
To their jeering and their jesting; 
"True is all Iagoo tells us; 
I have seen it in a vision, 
Seen the great canoe with pinions, 
Seen the people with white faces, 
Seen the coming of this bearded 
People of the wooden vessel 
From the regions of the morning, 
From the shining land of Wabun." 




THIS vast western country was 
claimed by the French in 1682, 
when La Salle sailed down the 
Mississippi, and, hoisting the Lilies 
of France, took possession in the 
name of Louis XIV. This land was 
called Louisiana, and for one hun- 
dred years belonged to France, being 
frequently visited by French priests 
and trappers. In 1763 it was ceded 
to Spain, but in 1800 passed again 
into French ownership. 

Napoleon, driven by the fear that 
England would take this vast west- 
ern possession from him, as it had 
taken Canada, concluded to sell it 
rather than lose it. 



32 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Thomas Jefferson, President of the United 
States, decided to buy this vast tract of land, 
which extended from British America on the 
north to the Gulf of Mexico on the south, and 
from the Mississippi Eiver on the east to the 
summit of the Rocky Mountains, and contained 
562,330,240 acres of land, for which the United 
States paid $15,000,000, or 2 3-5 cents an acre. 
Out of the Louisiana purchase thirteen states 
have been wholly or partially made, Louisiana, 
Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Kansas, 
Nebraska, Colorado, Montana, South Dakota, 
North Dakota, Wyoming and Oklahoma; Colo- 
rado, Minnesota, Wyoming, Kansas, Montana 
and Oklahoma include some territory, however, 
which was not in the Louisiana purchase. 

The shrewd and far-seeing Jefferson con- 
cluded to send out an expedition to explore the 
land he had purchased. Lewis and Clark were 
chosen and directed to explore the Missouri, the 
Columbia and perhaps other rivers of the north- 
west. Their expedition was one of the most im- 
portant ever sent out by the United States. 

We have only to deal with their trip through 
the present state of Nebraska. There was per- 
haps no gayer or more care-free company of men 
than the early voyageurs on the river boats who 
lived only for the " present moment," and a com- 
pany of these men, with laughter and song, 
started from St. Louis in two red and white 
pirogues, freshly painted, and with another big 
boat fifty-five feet long, carrying a sail, all well 
stocked with that which was needed for the trip. 



THE UNITED STATES BOUGHT LOUISIANA 33 

It was a long, toilsome trip up the river, row- 
ing against the current, the waters of the stream 
often lashed by the wind and rain. The heat, 
being intense at times, those on board were al- 
most overcome, but they finally arrived July 11, 
at a point opposite the mouth of the Big Nemaha 
River. July 15, they camped on the Little 
Nemaha and on the 18th rested just above the 
place where Nebraska City now stands. Going 
farther up the river they reached a point about 
fourteen miles above the present site of Omaha 
and here held the first Indian Council, August 3, 
1804, with fourteen Otoes and Missourians, who 
had a French interpreter. 

The change of Government from that of the 
French to that of the United States was explained 
to them, and they promised to obey the "Great 
Father," as they called the President, and asked 
that peace be made between them and the Maha 
tribe, with whom they were at war. When asked 
why they were at war they said, "We have no 
horses and when we borrow horses from the 
Mahas they scalp us." 

From this event the spot was called Council 
Bluffs, and Fort Calhoun now stands where the 
Council was held as nearly as can be determined. 

The Daughters of the American Revolution 
and the State Historical Society placed a boulder 
here, August 3, 1904. 

The party went up the river coming to Black 
Bird Hill, in the northeast corner of the state, so 
named for Black Bird, Chief of the Omaha tribe— 



34 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

a man greatly feared by his own as well as other 
tribes because any one who displeased him might 
meet death in a mysterious manner. It is said 
that a trader once gave him a quantity of arsenic 
and this he gave to his enemies with fatal re- 
sults. Black Bird, the Omaha King, died of 
smallpox, four years before the visit of Lewis 
and Clark, and was buried on the top of a high 
bluff that he might see the traders coming up 
the river. We are told his weapons and the 
scalps he had taken in war were tied to a pole 
above his grave, and that his favorite horse was 
here put to death. 

August 19, about three miles above the 
Omaha village another Indian council was held, 
and August 20, Sergeant Floyd, one of the 
party, died and was buried on the Iowa side of 
the river, a short distance from Sioux City, 
where a monument now marks his resting place. 

Having spent eight weeks and three days 
from the time of entering, July 11, to that of 
leaving the state, on September 8, the party 
passed the Niobrara Eiver and proceeded on its 
way west toward the Columbia River. 

After leaving Nebraska, they were guided on 
their trip from Fort Mandan, by Charbonneau 
and his wife, Sacagawea, a woman of the Sho- 
shoni tribe, to whom we owe a tribute to praise 
and grateful homage for her part in opening up 
the western half of our continent to civilization. 

Taken captive at fourteen years of age, wife 
and mother at sixteen, guide and interpreter for 



THE UNITED STATES BOUGHT LOUISIANA 35 

the Lewis and Clark expedition before she was 
seventeen, she unconsciously was a valuable aid 
in opening to civilization the great northwest. 

With her papoose on her back, she won 
the good will of the Indians along the route for 
her party, especially the Shoshoni tribe, guided 
it over mountain and stream, reached the Colum- 
bia Eiver, saw the great water, the Pacific, then 
patiently returned to the place on the Missouri 
River where the expedition embarked for St. 
Louis. 

The faithfulness and daring spirit of this re- 
markable woman were a great aid to the expedi- 
tion. There has been erected to her memory a 
monument at Portland, Oregon, and thus her 
fame is preserved to posterity. 

The journal of Lewis and Clark has been 
condensed and arranged for young people in a 
form most interesting and attractive. Moreover 
it gives a most authentic record of the life, cus^ 
toms, and conditions of the northwestern Indians 
and a vivid description of that vast and wonder- 
ful portion of our country which was their home. 



How Once Upon a Time 
the Fur Traders Came 



From the bottom rose the beavers, 
Silently above the surface 
Rose one head and then another, 
Till the pond seemed full of beavers 
Full of black and shining faces." 




vtf>» OON after Lewis and Clark made known to 
K*jj) the world the natural wealth of the country 
* r **~' through which they had passed — telling of 
herds of buffaloes on the plains, beaver, otter and 
countless other fur bearing animals in forest and 
stream — many trapping parties wjere formed 
eager to reap the rich harvest. 

Manuel Lisa, an ambitious trader of Spanish 
parentage, made a trip up the Missouri River in 
1807. He returned again and again to St. Louis 
with his boat laden with furs till he became 
known as the Fur King. In 1808, Lisa, with the 
Choteau brothers and others, with a capital of 
$40,000 organized the Missouri Fur Company, 



40 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

which at once established friendly relations with 
the Indians, trading guns, whiskey, cloth, beads 
and various articles for valuable furs. 

In 1812, a trading post was established at 
Point Lisa, near old Council Bluffs and about 
the same time the Missouri Fur Co., was or- 
ganized. John Jacob Astor of New York, a 
man of Dutch parentage, endowed with broad 
foresight and great daring, formed the American 
Fur company, which meant to control the fur 
trade of the northwest. In 1810, he fitted out 
two expeditions, one to go by sea and one by 
land to far away Oregon. 

The wily Manuel Lisa, jealous of any invasion 
into his country, no sooner heard of the Astorian 
expedition starting up the Missouri in 1811 than 
he gave pursuit, travelling day and night until 
he overtook it about fifty miles from the present 
Ft. Pierre. Averting an open conflict, Lisa 
actually helped the men of the expedition to dis- 
embark in Dakota and to start on their long 
westward journey. 

After months of cold, hunger, hardships and 
narrow escapes from the attacks of Indians, the 
Astorian party reached Oregon to find that the 
supply ship which had been sent round Cape 
Horn had been wrecked. Many thousands of 
valuable furs were collected, but sold to the 
Northwest Fur company for a fraction of their 
worth, and in 1813, some of the party might have 
been seen in the valley of the Platte river in 
Nebraska, wending their way back to St. Louis 
1<> tell the story of their failure. 



THE FUR TRADERS CAME 41 

John Jacob Astor's conception of such a 
scheme and his daring in undertaking it, dis- 
tinguishes him as one of the great commercial 
pioneers of the country. 

One hundred years after the organization in 
1810 of the Pacific Fur company, the Historical 
Society of Nebraska erected a monument on 
College Hill at Bellevue, to commemorate the 
Astorian expedition, it being unveiled June 23, 
1910, by the State Eegent of the Daughters of the 
American Revolution. 

The fur trade was, in time, centralized at 
Bellevue, which it is said, received its name when 
Manuel Lisa, standing on what is now College 
Hill, exclaimed "La belle vue" meaning beautiful 
view, and here the first permanent settlement was 
made in territorial Nebraska. Old Bellevue 
teemed with activity, for here came the Indians 
to dispose of their furs — trappers and traders 
carried on their great business without protec- 
tion of license until the first one was granted 
by the United States Government in 1825. 

The traders needed protection from the hostile 
Indians, and the Government established the 
first military post at Fort Atkinson, near the 
present site of Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. Today 
the spade and plow reveal bullets, buttons and 
other trophies, the only reminders of the old 
fort, the equipment of which was removed to 
Fort Leavenworth, while the Indian mission was 
removed to Bellevue. 
Between 1830 and 1840 the American Fur com- 



42 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

pany purchased the interests of the Missouri Fur 
company, and Peter Sarpy came up from St. 
Louis several years later to take charge of it. 
He and his Indian wife, Nakoma, had great in- 
fluence over the Indians, and were helpful 
through the interval separating the territorial 
government and the early statehood. 



How Once Upon a Time 

The Indians Roamed 

the Prairies 



"Should you ask me, whence these stories? 

Whence these legends and traditions, 

With the odors of the forest, 

With the dew and damp of meadows, 

With the curling smoke of wigwams, 

With the rushing of great rivers, 

With their frequent repetitions, 

And their wild reverberations, 

As of thunder in the mountains? 

I should answer, I should tell you, 

"From the forests and the prairies." 




THE Indian life is such an important part 
of Nebraska history that we must give a 
brief sketch of the main tribes. The Omaha, 
Oto and Missouri, Pawnee, various tribes of the 
Dakota or Sioux ; with the Cheyenne and Arapaho, 
of a roving disposition, in the extreme southwest, 
were the original or domestic Indians of Ne- 
braska. The Santee Sioux and the Winnebago 
were brought here not long ago. The Dakota or 
Sioux, were the most numerous of all the tribes 
and groups mentioned, but they did not all live 
within Nebraska. The Pawnee were the largest 



46 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

strictly Nebraska tribe. The Oto and Missouri 
occupied the southeast; the Omaha, the northeast; 
the Pawnee the central part; and the Sioux the 
northwest. So far as we know the Pawnee were 
the first of our Indians to see white men. It is 
probable that a company of them, from the south- 
eastern part of what is now known as Nebraska, 
visited Coronado while he was in Quivira. 

The Pawnee house was an earthen lodge 
and was dedicated with great religious 
ceremonies. They believed in a great power 
called Father and the winds, thunder, lightning 
and rain were his messengers. They cultivated 
the ground and raised corn, beans and other veg- 
etables, but hunting was one of their sources of 
food, a Chief governing the hunt, who saw that 
each family had its share of the animals killed. 
Their home was in the Platte Valley and they 
never made war on the United States, but the 
great trails crossed their country and contact 
with the immigrants changed their customs and 
life, as they suffered much from the depredations 
of the white man, who destroyed their crops and 
stole their horses. They were divided into 
tribes based on village communities, each village 
having its name, it altars, its sacred objects and 
priests. A council of leading men of char- 
acter and ability governed them and each chief 
had a crier who called out orders and other 
matters of interest. They were reduced by sick- 
ness and hostile tribes from ten thousand in 1836 
to six hundred and forty-nine in 1906. In 1876 
they gave up their reservation, which was all the 



THE INDIANS ROAMED THE PRAIRIES 47 

land they had left in Nebraska, and received a 
new reservation in the Indian territory, now 
Oklahoma. 

The Dakotas or Sioux were a very warlike 
tribe and caused great trouble with emigrants. 

There were many battles with the Indians not- 
able among them the Grattan massacre, Ash 
Hollow where General Harney defeated a large 
body of Indians, and the Custer massacre, in 
1876, which practically ended Indian warfare. 

Forts Kearney, McPherson and Sedgwick, 
were established for the protection of the fron- 
tier. In 1865 Julesburg, near Fort Sedgwick, 
was burned by a large body of Cheyenne and 
Arapahoe Indians. The Sioux were always at 
war with the Omahas, who occupied the north- 
east part of the state and finally the Omahas 
reduced by smallpox and war left their homes 
and gathered around Bellevue where they had 
the protection of the white men. Here they be- 
came connected with a French family by the 
name of Fontanelle through the marriage of one 
of their maidens to Lucien Fontanelle, who bore 
him four sons and a daughter. One of the sons, 
Logan, afterwards became a chief of the Omaha 
tribe. 

Lucien Fontenelle was descended from the old 
nobility of France, and lived in New Orleans 
with an aunt, Madam Mercier, and because of a 
severe reprimand ran away from home when he 
was seventeen, going to St. Louis and afterwards 
to Bellevue, Nebraska, where he became active 



48 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

in the fur trade. After several years Lueien 
visited his family in New Orleans, but was so 
changed in appearance, looking like the Indians 
with whom he lived that they refused to accept 
him until an old negro mammy recognized him 
by a mark on his body. He endeavored to induce 
his family to take his children but they indignant- 
ly refused to have anything to do with them and 
on his way back to Nebraska from this visit, he 
sickened and died, leaving his children in the 
care of Father De Smet, who saw they were edu- 
cated in Catholic institutions. 

In 1854 the Omaha tribe ceded to the United 
States all their land, except what has since been 
called the Omaha Reservation, the same spot 
where Lewis and Clark found them in 1804, and 
to which they were ordered to remove from Belle- 
vue. Logan Fontenelle, their chief, protested 
it would be suicidal to attempt to take his people 
away from the protection of the white man and 
throw them among the hostile Sioux around their 
reservation. The government insisted, however, 
and soon after Logan Fontenelle while on a hunt- 
ing expedition, with a number of his followers, 
was killed on Beaver Creek by the arrows of a 
party of Sioux who were in ambush. His fol- 
lowers carried his body to the bluffs above Belle- 
vue and buried it near the graves of his father and 
mother. 

The Omaha tribe lives on its reservation, and 
a daughter of Logan Fontenelle, Mrs. Tyndall 
was recently a guest at the beautiful hotel Fon- 
tenelle, built by the citizens of Omaha in 1015, 



THE INDIANS ROAMED THE PRAIRIES 49 

and named in honor of the Chief who did so much 
for his people. 

Over forty of his tribe came to a banquet 
given at the hotel and showed evidence of civili- 
zation and prosperity, many coming down in 
their automobiles, — a far cry from the old Indian 
travois or poles tied to the sides of the ponies, 
and the wigwam where they sat in a circle on 
the floor at meal time. 




Hotel Fontertclle 



How Once Upon a Time 

Indian Trails Became 

Roadways 



PROMISE OF THE WHITE MAN TO THE 
INDIANS. 

"I will send a Prophet to you, 

A Deliverer of the nations, 

Who shall guide you and shall teach you, 

Who shall toil and suffer with you. 

If you listen to his counsels, 

You will multiply and prosper; 

If his warnings pass unheeded, 

You will fade away and perish! 

" Bathe now in the stream before you, 

Wash the war-paint from your faces, 

Wash the blood-stains from your fingers, 

Bury your war-clubs and your weapons, 

Break the red stone from this quarry, 

Mould and make it into Peace-Pipes, 




'HE government sent several exploring ex- 
peditions to this unknown country, one of 
1$ which, under Stephen H. Long, returned 
with discouraging reports. The great trail of 
earlier days, known as the Oregon Trail, was be- 
gun by the trappers and fur traders who travelled 
over the Indian trails to make known the way for 
those who came after. The first wagons to pass 
over the trail as far as the Rocky Mountains, were 
taken out by Captain Sublett in 1832, who left 
Saint Louis with a train of ten loaded wagons and 
two dearborns, entering what is now Nebraska, 
at a point where Gage and Jefferson counties meet. 
He probably followed the Blue river and reached 
the Platte river about twenty miles east of 
Kearny, followed along the south bank of the 



56 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Platte river, crossed the South Platte near the 
present site of Megeath, west of Ogalalla, and 
upon reaching the south bank of the North Platte 
followed it to Fort Laramie beyond the state line. 

Frontiersmen were always ready to push for- 
ward to discover the mysteries of a new country, 
finding passage through the mountains into the 
country beyond, now known as Oregon, until 
this route came to be known as the Oregon 
Trail. All emigrants going to Oregon reached 
the Platte river, where they were sure of water 
for six hundred miles, and thus established a 
permanent route. 

The Indians having heard of the white man's 
religion counseled together, and sent, in 1832, 
four young Flat-Head Chiefs to the trading post 
at St. Louis to learn of this religion which was 
better than theirs. The account of this visit, 
reaching the Missionary Board at Boston caused 
it to send Dr. Marcus Whitman and the Rev. 
Samuel Spalding with their wives to occupy the 
field as missionaries and their long journey to 
the far west was begun in March, 1836. They 
reached the Ohio River by way of the Pennsyl- 
vania Canal, then down the Ohio and up the Mis- 
sissippi and Missouri to Bellevue, then known as 
Council Bluffs. Here they joined a party of the 
American Fur company, who were starting for 
Oregon, following the north bank of the Platte 
River. 

When well on their journey, this little band 
selected a spot, carefully spread their blankets 



INDIAN TRAILS BECAME ROADWAYS 57 

and as the sun illuminated the western sky, they 
lifted the American flag and with the bible in the 
center, they knelt and with prayer and praise, 
took possession of the western side of the Amer- 
ican continent in His name who proclaimed 
" Peace on earth, good will to men." 

These, being the first white women to cross the 
plains, were a great curiosity to the Pawnee In- 
dians, who called them White Squaws from over 
the trail. 

John C. Fremont was sent in 1843 to explore 
the Ne! raska country, and in this year about 
one thousand emigrants, led by Marcus Whitman, 
who had gone to Washington on a mission relat- 
ing to the possession of the Oregon territory by 
the United States, crossed the plains and moun- 
tains to Oregon. In 1844 and 1845 about four 
thousand, in 1846 over three thousand, and in 
1847 five thousand, made this same journey to 
establish homes in this far away land. 

Each spring found hundreds of canvass cov- 
ered wagons waiting to follow the trails along 
the Platte, and the Missouri was crossed in many 
places, but all emigrants finally reached the 
Platte valley. 

A day's journey was only from ten to twenty 
miles. The roads were cut from three to fifteen 
feet deep, by the heavy wagons and the washing 
of the rains, and can now, after more than half 
a century, be traced along both sides of the 
Platte Eiver. 

These companies of brave pioneers who 



58 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

sought their fortunes in the great wilderness had 
many thrilling experiences with Indians, wild 
animals and bandits, who were lurking to destroy 
life and steal their cattle. 

After crossing the Missouri Kiver they were 
outside the pale of civil law, and the instinct for 
fair play caused them to organize a high court, 
which made murder punishable with death, and 
stealing was attended by whipping with a long 
ox lash, which brought the blood with every 
stroke. 

Fatigue, hunger, sickness and death from 
cholera left great numbers in unknown and un- 
marked graves. Too much cannot be said of the 
sacrifices and fortitude of the women, their help 
and good cheer. 

There was one, Mrs. Rebecca Winters, 
who was so loved her friends sunk a wagon 
wheel to mark her lonely grave, and all coming 
after, went around this hallowed spot, and now 
a fitting monument, only a few miles from Scotts 
Bluffs marks the last resting place of this pioneer 
woman. In the same locality is an historic land- 
mark known to the early travellers as Chimney 
Rock, one hundred and forty-two feet above the 
base, which looks like a factory chimney. 

In 1846, fifteen thousand Mormons were ex- 
pelled from Nauvoo, Illinois, on account of their 
religious belief. Starting west about thirty-five 
hundred spent the winter on the west bank of 
the Missouri in Winter Quarters now known as 
Florence. In the spring of 1847, Brigham Young 



INDIAN TRAILS BECAME ROADWAYS 59 

led them westward, following the north bank of 
the Platte River, making the Mormon trail paral- 
lel with the Oregon trail on the south. Markers 
are being placed along the trails. 

In 1849 word came of the discovery of gold 
in California, which caused another rush of peo- 
ple, who mostly followed the Mormon trail, but 
is now known as the California or Overland 
trail. 

In 1852 Ezra Meeker, with his wife and 
month-old baby, started with an ox team and 
canvas covered wagon from Eddyville, Iowa, 
crossed the Missouri River at Kanesville, now 
Council Bluffs, and joined the wagon trains 
crossing the plains over the Oregon trail into 
the new country of Oregon. 

His book, " Ventures and Adventures of Ezra 
Meeker," gives a detailed account of this long 
and toilsome journey and describes his home on 
the Columbia, where he lived until the territory 
of "Washington was formed. Near Seattle, he 
started the growing of hops and, becoming a mil- 
lionaire, was a familiar figure on the Stock 
Exchange of London. He was known as the 
"Hop King" until an insect destroyed the hop 
fields of the whole northwest country. 

He travelled back over the Oregon trail fifty 
years afterward, and through his influence many 
markers have been placed. 

Contributed by Mrs. Edgar Allen. 



How Once Upon a Time 

Humble Homes 

Were Built 



' ' Thus it is our daughters leave us ! 
Just when they have learned to help us, 
When we are old and lean upon them, 
Comes a youth with flaunting feathers, 
With his flute of reeds, a stranger 
Wanders piping through the village, 
Beckons to the fairest maiden, 
And she follows where he leads her, 
Leaving all things for the stranger. ' ' 




FOLLOWING the California gold excitement 
the possibilities of Nebraska began to be 
noticed and a few years later towns sprang 
up along the Missouri River. So many emi- 
grants, following the old Mormon trail, crossed 
the Missouri at Kanesville that in 1857 James C. 
Mitchell, under the advice of Peter A. Sarpy of 
Bellevue, established a townsite at the old "Win- 
ter Quarters," or the present town of Florence, 
near Omaha. Several places of business and a 
bank were opened, and as tourists of the present 
time spin along the beautiful boulevard to the 
great pumping station of the water works for 
the city of Omaha, they pass the old bank of 



64 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Florence and are told the original vaults remain, 
although the building has been improved and 
enlarged. In the town park stands a grand old 
elm said to have been planted by Brigham 
Young. 

In 1853, William Brown, seeing the oppor- 
tunity for a town site where Omaha now stands, 
secured one hundred and sixty acres on the west 
bank of the river, which he sold to others who 
platted the town of Omaha, which was reached 
from Kanesville, or Council Bluffs, by a ferry 
known to travellers as the "Lone Tree" Ferry, 
so named because of a lone tree on the Nebraska 
bank of the river. 

In 1853 the first settlers crossed to the present 
townsite of Omaha — the name being taken from 
the Omaha Indians and meaning ' ' First upon the 
waters." Huts and dugouts were the first 
homes, but soon a house was built by Mr. Snow- 
den at 12th and Jackson and used as a hotel. 

Indians, deer, wolves and buffalo roamed over 
the prairies. 

The people, needing protection and the power 
to keep new settlers from jumping their claims 
formed claim clubs. First claims of one hun- 
dred and sixty acres, the title to which rested in 
the Government, were taken, but under claim 
club protection settlers tried to hold three hun- 
dred and twenty acres. 

The first claim cabin in Nebraska was built 
by Daniel Norton in 1853 between Omaha and 
Bellevue. 



HUMBLE HOMES WERE BUILT 65 

Settlers began coming in so fast, it was evi- 
dent that this vast country was of great value 
to the nation, and the people began to look to the 
question of legislation. After several attempts 
and failures to secure recognition, Stephen A. 
Douglas, in 1854, introduced into Congress the 
Kansas-Nebraska bill, which, from its slavery 
clause, tore the nation asunder, but finally passed 
both Houses, the slave question being left to the 
citizens, but before they were called on to adopt 
the Constitution, the slavery question was set- 
tled by the Civil War. 

Hadley D. Johnson, a provisional delegate to 
Congress from Nebraska, took an active part in 
changing the Nebraska bill so as to form two 
territories instead of one, — Kansas and Ne- 
braska. A treaty was made with the Omaha In- 
dians by which they ceded to the United States 
all the lands belonging to them, which were then 
opened to the white man for settlement. Great 
numbers of settlers came to the new country until 
the census of 1855 made returns of almost 5,000. 

Francis Burt of South Carolina was appointed 
the first Governor of the territory of Nebraska. 
Being a frail man, he died from the hardships 
of the trip soon after reaching Bellevue, the 
provisional capitol of the new territory. 

The secretary of the territory, Thomas B. 
Cuming, became acting Governor on the death 
of Governor Burt, and set the political ball roll- 
ing at a vigorous pace. It was supposed that 
Bellevue would be the capital of the territory, 



66 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

but the Presbyterian Mission demanded $50,- 
000.00 for the land the Governor wished for 
capital purposes. Great rivalry existed among 
the towns as to the location of the capital, and 
great indignation was felt when the first legis- 
lature convened in Omaha on January 16, 1855, 
in a brick building built for the purpose on Ninth 
between Farnam and Douglas streets, the loca- 
tion of which was recently marked with a bronze 
tablet by the Nebraska Society of Colonial 
Dames. 

A mob, gathered in the town threatening to pre- 
vent the assembly of the legislature — but order 
was restored, and the first session convened. 

Mark W. Izard was appointed Governor, and 
in his honor the first inaugural ball was given. 
There were nine ladies present, the Mesdames 
Thomas B. Cuming, Fenner Ferguson, J. Ster- 
ling Morton, Fleming Davidson, A. J. Hanscom, 
A. D. Jones, S. E. Eogers, George L. Miller and 
C. B. Smith. 

The colored servant of the Governor, having 
a high notion of the importance of his master, 
when he saw him coming, called out to the 
guests, "The Gubbernor approaches." There 
was one fiddler and the agile powers of those 
who took part in the dance were taxed to the 
utmost, for some one in his zeal scoured the 
puncheon floor, and the intense cold caused a 
covering of ice to form, which presented a peri- 
lous surface more fitted for skating than danc- 
ing. Supper was served at midnight, and as 



HUMBLE HOMES WERE BUILT 67 

tables were scarce in those days, it was passed 
around, after which the Governor, with chatter- 
ing teeth, made a speech and the first inaugural 
ball became history. 

Settlements were soon springing up here and 
there over the new teeritory. 

In 1854, J. Sterling Morton and his wife made 
Bellevue the end of their wedding journey, after- 
wards settling at Nebraska City, and from this 
time on were closely allied with the growth of 
the South Platte country. 

Soon the representation outgrew the first 
State House, and a new one was built in 1857 
and 1858 on Capitol Hill, the site of the present 
Omaha High School. 

"In 1862 the Free Homestead Bill was passed 
by Congress and signed by Abraham Lincoln, 
which enabled thousands of men to secure free 
homes. The first homestead in the United States 
was taken in Nebraska a few miles from Beatrice. 

Territorial Nebraska lay between the Mis- 
souri Eiver and the Rocky Mountains and be- 
tween latitudes 40 and 49 degrees. The word, 
Nebraska, means flat or spread out. 

Nebraska has been called the mother of states, 
as 351,558 square miles of Nebraska territory pro- 
duced the great states of Nebraska, South Dakota 
and North Dakota, about three-fourths of the 
greater state of Wyoming, nearly all of the 
immense state of Montana and a considerable 
part of Colorado. The North and South 



68 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Platte sections in Nebraska were hostile to 
each other and bitter strife resulted. The South 
Platte country attempted to secede and become 
a part of Kansas, but by the Wyandotte conven- 
tion this was averted, as the citizens of Kansas 
were having troubles of their own and did not 
care to annex a country largely democratic, so 
the southern boundary line of Nebraska remained 
and became fixed at 40 degrees of latitude. 

The location of the capital was a long fought 
question, and at one time the majority of the 
legislature went to Florence, attempting to settle 
the matter there, but the Governor refused to 
sanction their proceedings. At this time A. J. 
Hanscom was a powerful factor in the legislative 
body. He was noted for often adjourning leg- 
islatures by methods more characterized by their 
promptness than parliamentary proceedings. 

In 1860 conditions became such that a move- 
ment was started to secure statehood, and in 
1864 a bill passed Congress giving the people of 
Nebraska the right to vote on a constitution, but 
owing to the Civil War, it did not seem wise to 
proceed in the matter, and not until 1866 was a 
constitution submitted to the people. The fight 
for its adoption was bitter, as the Democrats 
opposed it, and it was finally adopted by only 
one hundred majority. The bill was passed by 
Congress to admit Nebraska to statehood. It 
was vetoed by President Johnson — was passed 
over his veto, and on March 1, 1867, Nebraska 
became a state. 



HUMBLE HOMES WERE BUILT 69 

The first State Legislature named a commis- 
sion consisting of Governor Butler, Secretary 
of State, and the Auditor, to select not less than 
six hundred and forty acres of land on which 
should be located the state capitol, university 
and state penitentiary, the town to be called Lin- 
coln. They selected a site in Lancaster County, 
and proceeded in 1868 to erect the state buildings 
of the new State of Nebraska, having secured 
nine hundred and sixty acres of land for state 
use. 



How Once Upon a Time 

Transportation was 

Limited 



I beheld, too, in that vision, 
All the secrets of the future, 
Of the distant days that shall be, 
I beheld the westward marches, 
Of the unknown, crowded nations, 
All the land was full of people, 
Restless, struggling, toiling, striving, 
Speaking many tongues, yet feeling 
But one heart-beat in their bosoms. 
Smoked their towns in all the valleys, 
Over all the lakes and rivers, 
Rushed their great canoes of thmider. 
I beheld our nations scattered, 
Saw the remnants of our people 
Sweeping westward, wild and woful, 
Like the cloud rack of a tempest, 
Like the withered leaves of autumn!" 




AVING followed Nebraska to statehood, 
let us take a backward view, and by com- 
paring the past with the present, learn 
what has been accomplished. First, consider 
transportation in times gone by and then at the 
present time. 

The first means of travel in Nebraska were 
the reed boats of the Indians on the rivers, and 
the travois, or trailing poles, fastened to the 
sides of the Indian ponies. The great highways, 
the Oregon, Mormon and California trails, the 
thousands of people passing over them into the 
unknown west were the greatest developing in- 
fluence in the settlement of Nebraska. At first the 
only way of getting mail to these people west of 
the mountains was by sailing vessels around Cape 



74 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

Horn, or by the Isthmus of Darien, which took 
many months. 

Now that the Oregon trail passed over the 
mountains, a monthly stage coach was established 
from Independence, Missouri, to Sacramento, a 
distance of two thousand miles, which was made 
in seventeen days. In 1861, a daily coach, drawn 
by six horses or mules, went swinging over the 
road at the rate of ten miles an hour. Baggage 
was limited to twenty-five pounds, and it cost 
twenty-five cents to send a letter. The passen- 
gers, mail and express were in care of the con- 
ductor, who sat beside the driver. 

The needs of the people requiring quicker 
service, it was suggested to devise some way 
for quicker time. In the spring of 1860 the pony 
express was established, which were men on horse- 
back, and who started weekly from St. Joseph 
and San Francisco, making the journey in about 
ten days. Each rider often times made thirty- 
three and one-third miles in three relays and 
even farther under favorable conditions. Their 
horses were swift and strong, dashing into the 
station at the end of ten miles flecked with foam, 
nostrils distended and flanks thumping with 
every breath. It took only a moment to throw 
the mail bags to the pony and rider in wait- 
ing, and away they rushed over the trail at 
the rate of two hundred and fifty miles a day. The 
means of communication were greatly quickened 
when the telegraph was put across from Brown- 
ville to Kearney in 1860 and reached San Fran- 
cisco in 1861. 



TRANSPORTATION WAS LIMITED 75 

Gradually homesteads were taken on the rich 
prairies, — towns were springing up along the 
Missouri River and railways were pushing west 
of the Mississippi. Men following the course of 
empire pictured a great future for this new and 
rapidly growing country. 

As the land began to be taken up along these 
old trails, the Creightons, Boyds, and countless 
others made fortunes carrying freight across the 
plains in great wagons drawn by oxen to supply 
the trading posts, ranchmen and travellers along 
the trails. 

BUILDING OF THE RAILROAD. 

In 1862, an act was passed by Congress to 
build a railroad from the Missouri River to 
San Francisco, which met with hearty approval, 
and many routes were discussed. President 
Lincoln finally, in 1863 fixed the eastern end on 
the Iowa side of the river at a point opposite 
the town of Omaha, and Thomas C. Durant was 
given charge of the work. There was great ex- 
citement and preparations were begun to cele- 
brate the breaking of the ground. The cere- 
monies began with prayer, then with pick and 
shovel the first earth was removed amid the roar 
of guns from either shore of the Missouri and 
shouts from the assembled throng. Speeches 
were made and a great supper and ball concluded 
the event. 

The "War of the Rebellion" being in pro- 
gress, money was scarce for such an undertak- 



76 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

ing, and it was hard to find men willing to risk 
their lives among the hostile Indians and endure 
the hardships on the frontier. 

In 1865 the Ames brothers took hold of the 
enterprise, and in three years, six months and 
ten days from the time of starting, they com- 
pleted one thousand and eighty-six miles, meeting 
the Central Pacific, Avhich had been built six 
hundred and eighty-nine miles east of San Fran- 
cisco. 

The meeting of the trains from the east and 
west at Promontory Point, Utah, May 10, 1869, 
and the driving of the Golden Spike was an event 
not only of local, but national rejoicing. There 
were military and civic parades in Chicago and 
all eastern cities to celebrate the completion of 
the first trans-continental railway ,this being the 
third great event in the history of the country 
to attract such wide attention, the other two be- 
ing the laying of the Atlantic cable and the con- 
struction of the Erie Canal. 

The first through train left Omaha September 
13, 1870, luxuriously equipped with five Pull- 
mans, one smoker, one baggage car and two 
coaches. The train was handled with air brakes 
and drawn by the locomotive, " General Sher- 
man," which made a speed of twenty miles an 
hour. Soon dining cars were put on and an 
addition of ten dollars to the fare was added 
for the service. The Union Pacific, Central Pa- 
cific and the Oregon Short Line, branches of the 
Union Pacific, follow the old Mormon-California 



TRANSPORTATION WAS LIMITED 77 

and Oregon trails known as the Platte Valley 
route, and while markers are being placed along 
the trails by the states through the efforts of 
Ezra Meeker, yet the great railways have already 
marked the way. 

As we see the powerful engines of the present 
day pulling a long line of coaches — or some sev- 
enty or eighty heavily laden freight cars over 
the well ballasted road beds, equipped with the 
block system to insure safety, it is easy to forget 
the pioneer of the canvas covered wagon train 
who yet lives to say, "I crossed the plains." 

A movement is on foot to establish a road 
from state capitol to state capitol, and a great 
national highway from ocean to ocean for auto- 
mobile travel is well on the way to completion, 
while flights of aeroplanes have been made over 
this stretch of country, all of which makes us 
realize we are far in advance of the canvas cov- 
ered wagon and pony express, but the limit of 
transportation is not yet; there are still greater 
things to be achieved in this progressive state of 
Nebraska. 

Contributed by Mrs. Edgar Allen. 



How Once Upon a Time 

Arbor Day Was 

Established 





THE first newspaper in the 
state of Nebraska was the 
Palladium, issued at Bellevue 
in 1854. The Arrow was the first 
Omaha paper, but printed in Coun- 
cil Bluffs, and the Nebraskian, a 
Democratic sheet, was the first paper 
printed in Omaha in a building where 
the Paxton Hotel now stands. Dr. 
George L. Miller established the 
Omaha Daily Herald in 1865, which 
later became the Daily World-Herald. 
The Omaha Bee was established in 1871 by 
Edward Rosewater, a man of indomitable will, 
whose struggles from a telegraph operator at 
night and a newspaper man by day — through 
financial stress, incendiarism and attacks by his 
enemies, until his paper became one of national 
reputation, shows the life of a man of power. 



82 HOW ONCE UPON A TIME 

The beautiful Bee Building in Omaha stands as 
a monument to this man of genius, who passed 
from life when resting from his labors in the 
office of his friend, Judge Troup, who with many 
other men of the city, had served as a reporter 
for this pioneer newspaper man. 

Other papers were The Omaha Daily News, 
The Nebraska Commonwealth, afterward, (State 
Journal), established in 1867 in Lincoln; The 
Nebraska City News, upon which J. Sterling 
Morton worked for $50 per month, and after- 
wards earned for himself a wide reputation 
as the founder of Arbor Day. 

His home at Nebraska City, Arbor Lodge, was 
one of the most beautiful established on the 
Nebraska prairies and a monument has been 
here erected to him — who did so much to con- 
vert Nebraska's bleak prairies into a land of 
groves and shady lanes. 

MILITARY HISTORY. 

Our military history has never been great, 
but as there was pressing need in early days of 
protection for life and property from attacks by 
the Indians, the territory was divided into the 
North and South Platte brigade departments, 
under command of General Thayer, and each 
neighborhood organized companies to protect its 
citizens. 

A military post was established at Old Fort 
Kearny in 1846, where Nebraska City now 
stands, but a few months later its small garrison 



ARBOR DAY WAS ESTABLISHED 83 

was sent to Mexico. Five companies wintered 
there — 1847-48 — on their way to establish New 
Fort Kearney, near the present city of Kearney. 

Fort Sidney was established in 1867, Omaha 
Barracks, 1868, known as Fort Omaha from 1878, 
and Fort Robinson in 1874. General Crook was 
first appointed commander of the Platte in 1875. 
During this command Fort Niobrara was estab- 
lished in 1880. 

Fort McPherson guarded well our frontier, 
and many interesting tales might be told of the 
soldiers' conflicts with the Indians. It was aban- 
doned, but later converted into a national ceme- 
tery, where many of those who served as sol- 
diers in the Civil and Indian wars now rest. 

The first regiment Nebraska Volunteers and 
the second regiment Nebraska Cavalry, were 
highly praised for brave conduct during the Civil 
War and for their defense of the territory 
against Indians. 

Many troops have been stationed at Fort 
Crook, six miles south of Omaha, and today a 
state militia is maintained. 

One of the great battleships bears the name 
of the state and was presented with a stand of 
colors by the Daughters of the American Revo- 
lution. 



Nebraska Triumphant 



Sing the Blessings of the Corn-fields ! 
Buried was the bloody hatchet, 
Buried was the dreadful war-club, 
Buried were all warlike weapons, 
And the war-cry was forgotten. 
There was peace among the nations ; 
Unmolested roved the hunters, 
Built the birch canoe for sailing, 
Caught the fish in lake and river, 
Shot the deer and trapped the beaver ; 
All around the happy village 
Stood the maize-fields green and shining, 
Waved the green plumes of Mondamin, 
Waved his soft and sunny tresses, 
Filling all the land with plenty." 






^FOSpwify 





EBRASKA is one of the 
largest states in the Union, 
having 49,157,120 acres of 
land within the most fertile section 
of the world, with a population of 
1,192,217 at the United States cen- 
sus of 1910. It is a rich and pros- 
perous commonwealth. Its growth 
commercially is evident everywhere 
— in its farms, stock, business 
houses, railroads, schools, churches 
and beautiful homes. 



88 NEBRASKA TRIUMPHANT 

The western part of the state is adapted to 
stock raising and Omaha is the second largest 
live stock and packing center in the world. 

Its horse ranches yield fortunes every year 
to their owners. The fine stock is sought for in 
other states, and the American hog as well is a 
great source of revenue. 

It is estimated the little red hen added to the 
wealth of the state in 1915 $17,500,000, and 
Nebraska ranks first as a producer of poultry 
and eggs. 

It is the largest sheep feeder market in the 
world, the little animals with their soft coats 
pay their owners for all care and trouble, and 
as a butter maker, the vast herds of cattle, place 
the state eleventh in rank, and Omaha has the 
greatest butter-market in the world, and Lincoln 
has the greatest creamery. 

The eastern part of the state is especially 
adapted to the growth of com, wheat, oats, hay 
and potatoes. Vegetables and fruit are put up 
at local canneries, and apples are bought on the 
trees, picked and shipped by agents from eastern 
markets, and the broad alfalfa fields bring great 
wealth to the farmers. As a beet raising state, 
Nebraska ranks third. 

Wealth from all sources pours into the banks, 
and the state deposits were estimated at $221,- 
198,442.94, in 1913. Nebraska's total wealth is 
estimated at about $5,000,000,000. 

Annual deposits of many millions are quite 
an increase over the little banks established in 
1856 by Millard and Caldwell and by the Kountze 



NEBRASKA TRIUMPHANT 89 

Brothers, which have now grown into the United 
States National and the First National Banks of 
Omaha. 

So silently and surely have the prairies of 
Nebraska converted the old canvas emigrant 
wagon into the golden argosy of state that it 
hardly seems possible to have come about within 
the memory of many men who live today. 

EDUCATION. 

Along educational lines our growth has kept 
pace with our development in other ways, which 
is the best evidence of the intelligence of our 
people; and statistics show that Nebraska, al- 
though it has a large foreign population, has the 
least percentage of illiteracy of any state in the 
Union. 

As settlers with their children came to the 
state, school houses sprang up like magic. The 
day of the little sod school house and the small 
one-room frame building is not to be despised, 
for some of our best men began life as pupils 
under their humble roofs. 

In 1865 John M. McKenzie, under the Metho- 
dist denomination, started Mount Vernon Col- 
lege at Peru, Nebraska, to cost ten thousand dol- 
lars. In 1867, the state legislature set aside 
money to complete it and passed laws to estab- 
lish a state normal school for the training of 
teachers. Prof. McKenzie was made the first 
principal. 

The legislature, in 1869, established a State 



90 NEBRASKA TRIUMPHANT 

University, which opened at Lincoln, Nebraska, 
in 1871, with eight professors and one hundred 
and thirty pupils. Dr. A. R. Benton was the first 
Chancellor. It now has about four thousand 
pupils enrolled and is fully equipped to meet the 
demands of a first-class university. 

The State Superintendent is now establish- 
ing, as fast as practical, vocational work. 

In 1898 was held in Omaha the Trans-Mississ- 
ippi and International Exposition, which from 
the points of beauty, education and financial suc- 
cess, attracted the attention of the entire country. 

The state is greatly indebted to an organiza- 
tion known as the Knights of Ak-Sar-Ben, — the 
name coming from spelling the word Nebraska 
backwards. This order brings together each 
year in Omaha not only the people of the state, 
but the business interests, and holds in the 
autumn a grand carnival, with day parades and 
night pageants, the floats of which have never 
been surpassed, closing with a grand ball in 
honor of the mythical King of Quivira. 

The beginning of a people, a state or a nation 
is always interesting, but when the beginning has 
resulted in a grand success the interest increases. 
The glow of youth is yet upon the brow of our 
beautiful state, which has been made in the life- 
time of many living actors. The flag of liberty 
and glory waves over no people more intelligent, 
prosperous and happy than those who dwell in 
what was once the far-away barren land of the 
Great American Desert — now known as Ne- 



NEBRASKA TRIUMPHANT 



91 



braska. We, therefore, pay reverent tribute to 
that honorable body of frontiersmen, the sturdy, 
strong fibered, princely pioneers who began the 
history of the beautiful state of Nebraska. 

"I have no words to speak their praise 
Their 's was the deed the guerdon ours. 

The wilderness and weary days, 
Were their 's alone, for us the flowers." 




AUTHORITIES CONSULTED. 

Sorenson's History of Omaha. 

Thwaite's Early Western Travels. 

Old Salt Lake Trail. 

Sante Fe Trail. 

Journal of Lewis & Clark. 

Histories of Nebraska, Watkins, Sheldon. 

Supplement to the Omaha Bee. 

State Historical Society. 

History of Union Pacific. 



ii ipHiii i ..j.i. m~*mwmwmwm i. «jw»»*. ww. • '>- ppwi. ji..i. i ii u u JINMiUU 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



016 086 319 5 




